cember

Making Education Open and Fair

I’ve always championed educational freedom because of one simple truth – when parents have a choice, kids have a chance. That’s why I joined Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah) in introducing the Accelerating Children’s Education (ACE) Act to bolster educational choices for American families. This legislation builds upon a provision of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act and enhances federal tax incentives for the enactment of state-level school choice legislation while addressing growing concerns among parents about the ideological influences in public education and the economic barriers to alternative schooling options. I’m proud to continue fighting to ensure every child – no matter their zip code – has access to a school that best fits their needs and provides them the opportunity to live out their version of the American dream. 

Read more about the Accelerating Children’s Education (ACE) Act here. 

Calling Out Chicago’s Anti-Student Policy

This week, I sent a letter to Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson and Board of Education President Jianan Shi, speaking out against their recent decision that could eliminate school choice for Chicago families, strip minority and low-income students of their preferred high schools and widen the achievement gap. I wrote that “Chicago’s 11 selective-enrollment high schools, which emphasize academic rigor and achievement, enroll nearly 10,000 Black and Hispanic students….[which] have been a lifeline for children from low-income and minority backgrounds whose families are desperate to provide them the best education possible.”

Read my letter in full here. 

This year, I continued championing issues such as border security, educational freedom, energy independence and combating national security threats such as Iran, China and Hamas. I’m shining the spotlight on a few pieces of legislation I championed and events I held to call attention to these issues. 

South Carolina

South Carolina was my priority as I strengthened a direct line of communication with constituents in 2023. My team and I assisted 7,320 South Carolinians with casework requests, an 80% increase compared to 2022, while sending over 82,000 letters to constituents throughout the year. 

Through the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2024 - Congress’s annual defense bill - I championed several legislative accomplishments for South Carolina, such as:

• $66 million in funding to complete new barracks at Fort Jackson;
• $4.37 million in funding to complete the National Guard Readiness Center at Joint Base Charleston; and
• $2.7 billion in funding to support the Savannah River Site, including $1 billion for plutonium modernization activities and $1.6 billion for operations and maintenance. 

Education

I kicked off the year with the largest ever National School Choice Week Student Rally at the U.S. Capitol, which was attended by more than 300 students from 10 D.C.-area public charter and private schools. I also secured House passage of my Parental Rights Over the Education and Care of Their (PROTECT) Kids Act – we must protect parental rights and ensure parents remain the lead decision makers in their child’s life. 

Restoring Law and Order

Throughout 2023, Americans watched as the border crisis escalated, with at times 12,000 illegal immigrants crossing into the U.S. daily. 70,000+ Americans die a year from fentanyl while 10+ million illegal immigrants have settled in our country. My Securing Our Border and FEND Off Fentanyl Acts were just a few pieces of legislation I introduced in an effort to pass real border reform that would end the flow of mass illegal immigration and stop the flow of fentanyl across President Biden’s open borders. 

National Security and Foreign Affairs

On October 7,  the world reeled when Hamas murdered 1,200 Israelis in a brutal terrorist attack. 35 Americans also died at the hands of Hamas - an Iranian backed terrorist group. I used my role as Ranking Member of the Senate Banking Committee to introduce the Revoke Iranian Funding Act, a bill to freeze $6 billion released by the Biden administration to Iran. In order to prevent U.S. tax dollars from winding up in the hands of Hamas, I also championed the Stop Support for Hamas Act. I was honored to end the year with a very emotional meeting with the victims and victims’ families of the October 7 attack. 

Throughout 2023, China escalated threats to U.S. national security. To combat its’ efforts to steal Americans’ data and infiltrate our institutions, I used my role as Ranking Member of the Senate Banking Committee to introduce the Know Your App Act to require app stores to display the country where an app is developed and provide users with the choice to filter out apps that come from countries of concern, like China or Russia. I also led the Protect Our Bases Act, legislation to help prevent China purchasing land near our sensitive military, intelligence and national laboratory sites.

Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs

This year, I was honored to take over as the top Republican on the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs in January. As someone who grew up in poverty in a single-parent household, I used my role as Ranking Member to focus on commonsense policies to create economic opportunity across the country. One of the most significant bills I introduced this year, the Renewing Opportunity in the American Dream (ROAD) to Housing Act, focused on making the American Dream of homeownership a reality for Americans who have been left behind.  

To read more about the Committee’s work this past year click here.

Fox News: Sen. Tim Scott blasts Chicago mayor for 'devastating' students with broken campaign pledge

I’m sharing this story from Fox News detailing my efforts to call out the radical left in Chicago whose actions could eliminate school choice for Chicago families, strip minority and low-income students of their preferred high schools and widen the achievement gap.

Reporting for Fox News, Andrew Mark Miller writes, “South Carolina Republican Sen. Tim Scott sent a letter Friday to the mayor of Chicago criticizing the Democrat over the city’s plan to shutter selective-enrollment schools, which Scott says would be ‘devastating’ to the community while also breaking a promise the mayor made on the campaign trail.”

Read the full article in Fox News here. 

This week, I’m spilling the sweet tea on the Pickens Police Department (PPD). After Corporal Lucas Watts survived a shooting on duty last month, the PPD hosted a benefit concert raising support for his family. Our state is proud to back the blue.

Read more about the benefit concert here!

Sincerely,

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